This is what a hero looks like.
I read a post on Facebook about a woman who lost her job
because she bitched about veterans getting discounts and being called
heroes. She had very little support, but
she had some.
The on-going government shut down, like the sequester, spreads pain
unevenly across America. Like any
Republican program, it will hurt the poor more than the rich, but any cut in
government programs will eventually cut veteran’s benefits. So the Republicans quickly moved to restore
benefits to veterans.
Sounds like something good.
It might be good in the short term, but government is a zero-sum
game. If you give money one place you
take it from another. So veterans get
benefits, but Headstart and school-lunch programs remain without money.
If the shutdown is a good idea, then veterans should be
screwed along with kids and cancer patients.
Because if we are not, eventually all those who care about kids and
cancer patients will remember that veterans got bennies when they did not.
I served when during Viet Nam when Rush Limbaugh, Bill
O’Reilly, Michael Savage, Dick Cheney and other draft dodgers were sneering at
veterans. And the public thought of us
as baby killers and college-student killers.
When we mobilized for Iraq, our commander said, “Envy
destroys community.” He was right. Now he is in the U.S. Congress and supporting
the shutdown. I hope he remembers his
own speech. The longer this shutdown
drags on, the more envy will eat at those who lost paychecks, lost research
grants, lost school-lunch programs, and lost clinical trials for their child
with cancer.
The public could hate us again. With reductions in force, we will soon be less
than one half of one percent of the population.
More people in America have PhD degrees that are currently serving in
the military.
Nobody likes people who cut in line.
